Enough Is Enough

HS Dillon, Jakarta Post | Tue, 09/06/2011 7:00 AM

During recent years, the government has been allocating increasing amounts of funding for poverty alleviation, which is then dispersed to all regencies, and a number of agencies and ministries.

However, there is growing concern that these central-administration-driven programs seem to be losing some of their effectiveness, either because we are now dealing with extreme poverty or that more local solutions are called for.

On top this, within the bureaucracy poverty alleviation has come to be widely accepted as yet another project, with all attendant connotations.

The National Commission on Human Rights has been driven to the forefront by the principle that poverty comprises a violation of human rights, especially abject poverty, which strips away human dignity and threatens life itself.

That poverty wears the face of a woman has long been recognized by the National Commission for the Prevention of Violence against Women. Upon women falls the onus of feeding poor families, and women become even more vulnerable when driven into the sex trade.

The Commission for Child Protection fears that if current conditions persist almost 100 million poor children will be denied proper nutrition, health and education.

The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) realizes that “corruption is stealing from the poor”, as plundering the state coffers inevitably results in even smaller budgets for fighting poverty.

In the eyes of the Ombudsman, shoddy quality of public services leads to poverty and discrimination further prevents the poor from gaining proper access to the very services which could enable them to climb out of poverty.

By stepping forth together, these national commissions are living up to their mandates to strengthen the state and give the public greater prominence in helping ensure that subsequent policies crafted to deal with the collective problem of poverty are rendered more effective.

The state institutions recently convened at the Proclamation Monument in Central Jakarta, depicting Sukarno and Hatta who led this country into independence 66 years ago. In his “Birth of Pancasila” speech on July 1, 1945, Sukarno emphasized that the principle of social justice dictated that “there would be no poverty in an independent Indonesia”.

Indeed, there is absolutely no justification for poverty to exist in this land of abundance. However, we are still getting a daily barrage of heart-rending cases such as that of poverty driving parents to double-suicides in East Bekasi, West Java. A homeless mother was left to give birth unattended in her bamboo shack only 50 meters away from a radio station in Gresik, East Java. What sort of society are we living in, anyway? Do we still retain any right to claim we are cut from the same cloth as Sukarno and Hatta?

The conspicuous consumption of the unheeding elite amid glaring urban poverty seems to be contributing to the current sense of despair. Indeed, many of the elite appear to have inherited colonial attitudes that regard rampant poverty among the “lazy natives” as an inescapable fact; “Theirs is a ‘culture of poverty’ and they do not respond to economic incentives. They are the government’s responsibility — We don’t have anything to do with them”.

Holding such beliefs, they continue cavorting around in Lamborghinis and Hummers, vying with the global elite in sporting designer accoutrements, proving the dominance of the “culture of apathy” over enlightened self-interest.

It is thus evident that poverty is a result of both commission and ommission. Many of us very recently practiced self-restraint to varying degrees. If properly observed, Ramadhan possesses the power to transform us into higher beings, returning us to our original sinless state.

Therefore, we should — as a people and not just a collection of individuals — go back to basics, back to the original intent of creating the Republic: to create social justice for all the Indonesian people!

It is high time that we stepped forward to create new space, new language and new ways of fighting poverty. Space that features Indonesians helping fellow citizens climb out of poverty without waiting for the government. The language of justice and fraternite from which hope springs eternal, reviving the age-old gotong-royong or mutual-assistance which remains the most effective way to attack the roots of poverty, based on indigenous capacity.

Have we been adequately inspired by the sacrifices following the Proclamation and infused by the spirit of sharing with the less fortunate during Ramadhan to take a strong stance and declare: Enough is enough?

Do we possess the determination to work harder, to be more truthful, and study more diligently to infuse meaning into the thousands of remains of those who gave up their lives for our independence?

Can we summon the moral courage to put our positions on the line and wage open war on the corrupt?

Only our conscience can serve as a guide as to whether we step forth as paragons of those fighting for social justice and sharing with their fellow-citizens, or whether we follow the herd donning the robes of ritual masquerading as pious and sanctimonious beings, yet walking away unperturbed from fellow countrymen wallowing in abject poverty.

Whether we leave a legacy of genuine piety or slick public relations, love of God or subservience to Mammon, charity straight from the heart or contemptible charade, the choice is ours alone.

The writer is presidential special envoy for poverty alleviation

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